Make Me an Instru­ment of Thy Peace

In the Fore­word to his book The Inward Jour­ney, Dr. Thur­man writes:

There are not many win­dows in these med­i­ta­tions; they are as the title indi­cates, an Inward Jour­ney. It may be that if there were more illus­tra­tions, the mean­ing could be more quick­ly grasped. The choice here is delib­er­ate. It is my hope that they will make read­ing and reread­ing reward­ing and sus­tain­ing. The pur­pose remains ever the same: to focus the mind and heart upon God as the Eter­nal Source and Goal of Life. To find Him as Com­pan­ion and Pres­ence is ​“to do just­ly, and to love mer­cy, and to walk humbly” with Him.

“Lord, make me an instru­ment of Thy Peace.” These words, tak­en from the prayer of St. Fran­cis, speak to one of the most insis­tent con­di­tions of the human spir­it. It is not easy to be an instru­ment of peace because we under­stand so lit­tle about the anato­my of hos­til­i­ty and its par­tic­u­lar kind of eti­quette. Again and again we use our words to pro­tect our­selves, to ​“put oth­ers in their place,” to humil­i­ate and to wound; some­times, quite uncon­scious­ly. Have you ever been caught in the back­wash of your words which hit their mark, result­ing in an injury which was not part of your intent? All of this because you were too pre­oc­cu­pied with your own inter­ests, your own con­cerns to take into account the oth­er per­son? At such a moment your good word may eas­i­ly become an instru­ment of violence. 

Ask your­self, ​“Have I ever indulged in gos­sip which gave me an oppor­tu­ni­ty to say some­thing unchar­i­ta­ble about some­one else? Of course, if I had not heard the gos­sip and passed it on, then there would have been no chance for me to express my qui­et hos­til­i­ty and, at the same time, be relieved of the respon­si­bil­i­ty for it. When I par­tic­i­pate in the shared rumors and the gos­sip around me by pass­ing them on or by refrain­ing from stop­ping them with what I know to be the facts and the truth, I let my atti­tude and my influ­ence become instru­ments of vio­lence in my hands.” 

I offer my prayer to God: 

“Lord, make me an instru­ment of Thy Peace.” Teach me how to order my days that with sure touch I may say the right word at the right time and in the right way — lest I betray the spir­it of peace. Let me not be deceived by my own inse­cu­ri­ty and weak­ness which would make me hurt anoth­er as I try des­per­ate­ly to help myself. Keep watch with me, O my Father, over the days of my life, that with abid­ing enthu­si­asm I may be in such pos­ses­sion of myself that each day I may offer to Thee the full, unham­pered use of me in all my parts as ​“an instru­ment of Thy Peace.” Amen.